


Pray for Rain (Choral Version)

by zvi



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Apocalypse, Character of Color, Gen, Remix, science-fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-07-01
Updated: 2007-07-01
Packaged: 2017-10-02 02:03:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zvi/pseuds/zvi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Atlantis, people get on with their lives.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pray for Rain (Choral Version)

**Author's Note:**

> Remix of [Pray for Rain](http://www.inlovewithnight.com/prayforrain.html) by [](http://inlovewithnight.livejournal.com/profile)[**inlovewithnight**](http://inlovewithnight.livejournal.com/)

Steven freaks the fuck out when he gets there. It's not military and it's not helpful, but his first reaction to an empty, unresponsive, fully-powered city of Atlantis is fifteen seconds of silence followed by a too loud, "What am I going to do with the goddamn _turtles_?"

His people are on it, though. They ignore his outburst and do their jobs. The kid at communication, Dickenson, points out there are still people on the mainland. They send down a team, and thirty minutes later, send down another team with the turtles. The Wraith will be pissed when they find out they didn't get a shipment, but Steven's more concerned about finding the missing outpost.

The Athosians don't know anything, but their leader Halling sends his oldest son Jinto with them to explore the city, the alpha and beta sites, the trade worlds if it comes to that.

Steven almost wants to ask for ten members of the village, but he doesn't. For the first time in a long time, the Athosians are cut off from the rest of the galaxy, only able to survive on what they can wrest from the place where they live. He feels a lot better about using the _Apeliotes_ to haul giant turtles across a galaxy to feed Wraith.

* * *

They are one of the last groups to go. Ronon waited to follow Sheppard, and at first he thought that Sheppard was waiting to follow Weir. But then he realizes that Sheppard had not moved since Atlantis threw him out of its chair. Ronon puts Weir over his shoulder, and shoves Sheppard into the next open iris.

They stumble through to a dusty plain. It is unguarded and the scrub around the gate untamed. So they won't have to fight anyone for a place here, but they can't join a village or a town that is already set up. On the whole, Ronon prefers people, but solitude's not bad, especially when at least one of their party is crazy. He isn't sure if Sheppard's wounds will heal, but Weir is down for the foreseeable future.

At least this is a forest, temperate, so there's water and shelter from rain, both. He sets Weir down against a tree, just inside the forest and hidden from the gate. He waves at Sheppard, then pokes him when he can't get Sheppard's attention. "Watch her. Watch the gate. Keep her from wandering off. Hide from anyone who comes through."

Sheppard doesn't say anything or nod, but he gets up and stands in front of a tree where he can see Weir and the gate.

That will have to be good enough. Ronon goes looking for a cave or hollow to shelter in and something to kill and eat.

* * *

"I believe we should begin looking for the others," says Teyla. She looks at the rest of her council: Parrish representing the scientists, Cadman for the military, Leshta of Kernan for the Pegasus humans, and Julie for the Wraith.

"We've been looking for them," says Leshta. "We go to a planet looking for trade and ask about refugees."

"No." Cadman shakes her head. "That's not looking. That's trading and gossiping. We need to do this more systematically: contact our allies and our enemies, let people know we're looking, set up a receiving team on the gamma site."

"That requires too much manpower. We need to concentrate on creating the resources to feed those who are here. Everyone knows the gate address for this site. If they are free to go, they can get here. And if they are not, we do not have the resources to bust them out." Parrish frowns. "Or pay ransom or bail or whatever."

"Most of your value in this galaxy came from your access to advanced technology, and your supply of turtles," says Julie. "Without those things you are…." She makes a sweeping downward gesture with her arms and grins at Teyla, showing her teeth.

"There is a large hatchery on Olesia. We could take almost no turtles in the evacuation. Perhaps, it would be best…," says Teyla, and uses her own scary smile.

Julie nods, but says, "We must take them something. We cannot go empty-handed."

"Distribution." Cadman raps her fingers on the table. "The _Apeliotes_ will be here soon. Once they find the empty city and try to look through it, the next step is to go to the alpha site. They'll bring the turtles to us, and we can arrange for Olesia to be the turtle distribution center for the next two supply runs."

"Ten," says Julie, but her mouth covers her teeth, so it's clear she is negotiating.

"Four," says Cadman.

Julie shakes her head. "It must be at least six."

"Five is all I _can_ offer. Our government may pull out of the Pegasus before a sixth run." Cadman's mouth twists up and she shrugs, lazily, like it's not important, so Teyla knows Cadman cares very much.

"Five, then. We will go tonight. Some of the drones are…restless."

* * *

Ronon always thought the Earthers talked too much. But now, their silence smothers him, scares him. How can he know they're alive if they don't talk? How can he see what's broken?

He tried asking questions — why did the City kick us out? where did it send the others? did it kill the Wraith? — but they don't respond.

He tried telling stories, stuff from his days as a kid in Sateda, his favorite plays. But Ronon's not a storyteller, and his words dried up pretty fast.

As with so many things in life, he finally winds up imitating his mother. When his brother Kenet was young, she talked constantly, just narrating her actions and Kenan's and Ronon's, an incessant chatter that had left Ronon with no place to insert his own thoughts.

"I'm going outside," he says. "It's getting dark out. I'll start a fire." Every day, once a day.

"It's morning, do you feel any better?" Once a week or so, he says it, and never gets a reply.

"We smell. We should take baths. I think this planet was inhabited before; there's soaproot growing wild near the river bank. It's something." That's after two weeks, and by then Weir can be led down to the river instead of manhandled.

"Sheppard, can you hunt today? I twisted my ankle." He hasn't twisted it bad enough that he _has_ to stay off it, but if he _can_ he will be pain-free tomorrow instead of a week from now. He just has to trust that Sheppard will come back.

He trips over nothing when Sheppard says, "I'll cook it, too."

* * *

Rodney slumps off his cot and hauls himself to the science shed. He is surprised that no one stops him. But then he catches sight of his reflection, and remembers the beard, and the weight he lost in that place, and doesn't wonder.

"Talk to me," he says when he opens the door.

Parrish jumps up from his paperwork, a frown on his face. "You haven't been released yet. Go back to medical."

Rodney smiles, because Parrish will give him what he wants. Zelenka could have outstubborned him, but not a botanist, never a botanist. "You need grow lamps and irrigation systems, don't you?"

Parrish snorts. "Oh, please. That's mechanical and civil engineering. The _Marines_ can do that."

Which is true, and Rodney sits down, because who needs an astrophysicist to grow corn? Also, his breath is coming shorter and he's going to start wheezing in a minute. "Yeah, they can build it, but do they have the skills to trade for raw material?"

Parrish rolls his eyes and sits back at his desk, picks up his paperwork. "What do you want, McKay? Some of us have work to do."

Rodney rolls _his_ eyes, because botanists are pussies. Hell, even _Ford_ would have argued another two minutes before giving in. "Where _are_ the rest of us? I know the Wraith were sent away, but it looks like half the humans didn't make it back."

Parrish looks down. "The Pegasus people mostly got dropped here or on major trade planets. Lots of them stayed, or found immigrant communities somewhere less dangerous than with us. Same thing with the newest military grunts and the glorified lab techs." He swallows and shrugs, looks up at Rodney. "Officers, lead investigators, even those IOA inspectors are mostly the ones missing. Some of you made it back, and it's mostly stories like yours: Genii-controlled worlds, smugglers' planets, hellholes like Taranis. Zelenka lucked out, he got sent to Sateda so he made it back pretty fast. And all of the Athosians in the city wound up on Athos, so Teyla Emmagen came back fast, too. But we still haven't found Sheppard, Keller, Weir, Ronon, Campbell, or a lot of people."

Rodney surprises himself by turning to one side and throwing up. He had assumed that everyone was too busy running things to come see him, and Teyla and Zelenka were, but the others…he doesn't want to think of them in a place like he was. "Has anyone gone back to the city, to see if we can get some information about gate locations out of it?"

Parrish shakes his head. "No one's going to the city. Caldwell sent an away team when he got there and we were gone. It killed them. Atlantis hates us, and there's no reasoning with it."

"That's unusually anthropomorphic for a botanist." Rodney's stomach hurts now and he wants to curl up in a ball, but he will not show weakness in front of a botanist. It doesn't matter if his city has dumped him, it doesn't matter if he caused it to wake up by finding that third god_fucking_damn ZPM. He must maintain face in the front of the life sciences.

"It's not. After it killed Caldwell's team, it sent them back with a note that said, 'The Wraith and their followers will die. Atlantis will destroy you.'"

"The culling's been over for three years," says Rodney.

Parrish shakes his head. "Not for the city."

* * *

Ronon sleeps, curled up with Sheppard and Weir. There aren't any large predators whose territorry overlaps theirs, so there's no need for a nightwatch. And Weir sleeps better when she's warm.

A noise wakes him, the _whoosh!_ of a gate. He shakes Sheppard and Weir awake, but with his hand over their mouths. It's not necessary to keep Weir quiet, but she gets agitated at changes from routine, and holding her calms her. He whispers in Sheppard's ear, "Cave," and Sheppard takes Weir out the back of their shelter to the bolthole.

He slips out to the other side, to see who or what is coming. There are five people walking out, and they are dressed like the Earth people. He does not recognize them, and he doesn't call out. It's been months since they were gone, and if the Earthers were living like refugees, their clothes would be patched and worn, mixed with the clothes of the Pegasus.

Instead, he follows silently as they make their way further out, finding the shelter he and Sheppard have cobbled together to try to last out winter. One of them says, "I think I know this knife. It's Dex's."

Ronon stands and calls out, "Lorne?"

The five men in the clearing turn, point their weapons at him, then pull them up and away.

"I told the Colonel we should put a bell on you." Lorne comes forward, and his fingers are spread open and reach out in that way where Ronon is sure Lorne wants to touch him.

Ronon grabs him and hugs him. He wouldn't have, usually, but if there's Lorne, there's more Earthers, Katie Brown or someone who can make Weir and Sheppard better. And he needs to touch Lorne, too, smell that there is someone outside of this cocoon he has been trapped in, where he's been the leader and the smart one and the sane one. It's not a position he's really comfortable with. "He's here," says Ronon. "Sheppard and Weir both are with me."

"Incredible," whispers Lorne, and Ronon wouldn't have heard it if he hadn't been so close. Lorne steps back and said, "We've found the last of the missing sheep. Go radio home, Kaufman."

"You can't dial out," says Ronon. "There's no power. I would have brought them to the Alpha site, otherwise."

Lorne nods. "We brought a portable DHD. Most of the command structure of the city was sent to places like this."

* * *

Ronon wakes up because Weir's arm is blocking his mouth and nose, making it difficult to breathe. She's on his right arm and Sheppard has a death grip on his left, so there's nothing for it but to bite her. She rolls away, which he was expecting, but onto the floor, which he was not.

He turns over as far as Sheppard will allow and says, "Are you okay?"

She says, "Alive." She stretches, and when her shirt pulls up over her waist, he can only just make out her ribs.

"You want to get something to eat?" he says. Her cheekbones are still too prominent for his liking, and she wears long-sleeved shirts in summer.

"John." She sits down on the bed next to him and picks up his PDA.

He doesn't take it from her. Anything sensitive is password-protected, and the only thing on his schedule today is marine hand to hand training. She's right. It'll be better for the three of them to wait to get breakfast when Sheppard wakes up.

He's warm, there's food that someone else has caught and cooked, and someone else will watch Weir and Sheppard when he goes to work. He turns over, wraps an arm around Sheppard, and drifts off to the sounds of people going about their business in New Atlantis.


End file.
